Hi,

I am the Executive Director of the Silverton Area Chamber of Commerce and i receive your newspaper.
I have been reading the letter to the editors and it strikes me that there is a lot of misinformation and facts going around about Silverton’s economy and the business community. Specifically a recent letter from Hutch Hutchinson addressed to a Grant.
It stated that there were 9 businesses and one RV park out of business due to OHV ban and that is not a factual statement.
We have not had one business close due to OHV directly and there has been not one RV park that closed. I am not sure where these numbers and information is coming from; do you know where these non facts are originating from?
We actually have Colorado Tourism Data showing that the first summer without OHVs, we had the most unique cell phone numbers (that is how they track people though our communities) during 2022. We have started to see a small trend down each summer after the pandemic boom of travel to our region which is right in line with Southwest Colorado, Colorado and the entire Nation.
I just want to correct any misinformation being stated “as fact” about Silverton.
I would be open to a conversation about our economy and businesses.
OHV’s were “political” over on this side of the mountain and tearing our community social fabric apart. Now we are more peaceful about it with each other and have focused on more sustainable and secure forms of economy because just the “political” nature of OHV tourism made it unsustainable and fickle.
We brought in Community Builders, a Colorado non-profit to help our community create a 10 year Compass Master Plan and talk through these tough issues. Here is copy of what came out of those community conversations and now we have a master plan that we all work towards. The Compass Project | Town of Silverton (colorado.gov)
The community went through tough years with the OHV vote coming back up every few years and then the pendulum finally swinging to a vote that no longer allows them into our town. Just because it is up for vote now, doesn’t mean that whatever the vote ends up, that the vote will not come back. What i learned in the last 10 years of my ED position is that we needed to put our energy into a reliable, sustainable economy that was not “political” and creating such turmoil amongst friends and neighbors. It hurts my heart to see Lake City going through what we have gone through but rest assured, there is light at the end of the tunnel.
Thank you,
_{DeAnne Gallegos
Executive Director
Silverton Chamber of Commerce}